Saturday, June 27, 2009

Ok, so about a month ago, I posted an entry entitled, "See ya on the way down".

Since that time, I've been asked on three random occasions, who it was who had broken my heart.

A few mornings ago, I happened to walk into the kitchen, to over hear my daughter, Kyla asking, my husband, "Hey Dad, so...who was the "asshole" Mom was talking about in her blog". Of course, up until that point, Ray hadn't read the entry and now, he was asking me the same question. Then, I get a message on Facebook from a friend of a friend in High School, that thought I was referring to him! Oh for the love of nerve!

Now, I had to go back and read my own entry to refresh my memory, but I was pretty sure I knew who I was referring to. Thankfully, I don't know that many assholes!

So, now for all the inquiring minds, I am ready to reveal the truth!

::::visualizing all the little hearts racing with anticipation::::

The person I was referring to was my first serious relationship when I was 17 years old and while it hardly matters now, it obviously taught me enough about love, self respect and personal growth that I wrote about it so many years later!

The other reason I chose to write about this particular person is that I learned that he was recently arrested for theft. He was managing a store that had just been equipped with video cameras and was caught stealing.

I guess for some people personal growth and self respect will remain elusive and while I'm sure this won't come as any surprise to some (right, Jeff)..he's still an asshole!

Monday, June 22, 2009

I consider myself to be a reasonably honest person, so when things like this happen, it pisses me off beyond all definition of the word.

As many of you know we got royally screwed when we recently adopted our cat, Persephone. We were exposed to a potentially serious illness when the rescue agency misrepresented her actual health status. We paid $200.oo in veterinary expenses for a very ill cat we'd only owned for 4 days, paid an additional $35.00 to cancel the check for adoption fee. The rescue/adoption agency, promised to reimburse us 30% of the vet bill, which never happened and today, we received our check back in the mail marked "void" with a note from the adoption coordinator that read, "don't call me again".

Don't call her again? Excuse me, but we still have no idea what became of Persephone, we still haven't been reimbursed, they still have the cat carrier that we used to bring Persephone to the hospital....don't contact her again?

I'm certain that the person who wrote this message is very upset right about now. That's seems to be what happens when people are caught in a web of their own deceit. You see, after my phone calls and e-mails had gone unanswered, I finally decided that I was not going to have my family exposed to a potentially serious illness and get ripped off for $435.00 in the process.

My first order of business was contacting the New Jersey Chapter of the ASPCA and filing a report of animal abuse. That was followed by an e-mail to the Department of Health in the town this agency operates informing them of the potential health hazard they are perpetuating, an email was then sent to PetSmart's corporate offices informing them of the liability involved in having an agency that adopts out animals with infectious diseases to their customers and finally today, an email was sent to the Bergen County Division of Consumer Protection. No, I venture to say that Angels for Animals Network is not at all happy.

What is the acronym that my kid's often use? "TFB" (Too Fucking Bad!) I tend to prefer "DLIBMA" (Don't like it? Bite My Ass!)

I've spent many a sleepless night in the past couple of weeks wondering if, in trying to give Persephone a loving home, I didn't expose my family to serious illness. So far, thankfully, we're all good. But, it wasn't only my family's health that I thought about. I recalled the first time I saw Persephone at PetSmart. There was another family there adopting her litter mate. A little girl and her Mom stood waiting to fill out their adoption application. I asked the girl, "are you taking that baby home?" She shook her head enthusiastically. I've thought of them often and hoped that they were all doing well or if like us, they've already spent hundreds of dollars because they believed they were adopting a healthy pet.

I really don't enjoy conflict and I try to avoid it whenever possible, but where my family is concerned..woe betide the creature that fucks up in my garden!

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Well, if things stay on course, this will go down as the coldest and rainiest June on record. It has rained 14 of the 15 days of the month. I can barely remember what the sun looks like and I've officially lost my mind!!!

That said, I think it's safe to assume that the myth about Witches melting when water is tossed on them is a bunch of crap!!!

If not, you'd be receiving this message from my husband informing you of my untimely demise, with accompanying photos of the puddle where I used to be. This might come as quite a surprise for some (and you know who you are), yet for me, might actually be amusing enough to risk getting wet for!

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Merry Meet Family, Friends and Followers. I hope this finds you all in some place that actually isn't raining!!!

I am always amused and I must say, confused, when people refer to me as a "Natural Witch". What does that mean, exactly? If being a Witch means anything at all it should at least begin by being "natural". Wicca, after all, is a nature based religion.

If being a "Natural Witch" means that I don't buy into all the "new agey" or "pseudo-intellectual" crap that some attribute to magick, then I have to agree. Most of what I attribute to "witchery" comes from within and is solely based on my own intuition. It's been part of who I am since I was a kid. That is not to say that I haven't spent countless hours reading, studying and learning everything I can over these past 13 years, only that I am discriminating in what I attribute to actual knowledge. I feel that I have been blessed to have been taught and continue to learn from those that are "Natural Witches"in the truest sense of the word.

That said, there are major differences between possessing wisdom and having facts. You can study as much as want from a million different sources, on a ton of different topics related to Wicca, Witchcraft and the practice of magick, but if little of that knowledge is intuitive, what you have is basically a lot of interesting facts. For me, if something actually works...that's magick. I don't need to research it, do too much planning, or think it to death for it to be successful.

Witchcraft, as it is known today, began with the practices of Shamans, Medicine people, Herbalists, etc. They were the people who's natural talents were experiential, intuitive or passed on by hereditary. Perhaps this is why I have an affinity for the "root" practices, such as Voodoo, Louisiana Hoo Doo and Folk Magick. It's Earthy, it's real and it works! You can't run to Barnes and Noble or Amazon, pick up a few books and call yourself an expert. In fact, true root workers are very particular about with whom they share their wisdom...as they should be.

In her book "Lid Off the Cauldron", Patricia Crowther writes;

"To become a witch you must have a natural inclination to worship the Old Gods. It must be a feeling which springs from the heart and carries you on towards your goal, in exactly the same way it happened to the first witches thousands of years ago."

Ok, well that pretty much says it all for me. And trust me, when you encounter someone who truly fits this description, they couldn't conceal that "natural inclination" if they wanted to.

Monday, June 15, 2009

I fear I am the bearer of sad tidings once again. As many of you know, we adopted Persephone last weekend. Unfortunately, her stay with us was brief.

I found Persephone at a local PetSmart, which here in New Jersey, is an "everything pets" store. She was actually a rescue from the home of someone that was hoarding animals. This person had many Himalayan cats that were not spayed or neutered and that just kept reproducing. Persephone was from one of those litters. She and her siblings were severely neglected, so naturally, as I do with most living creatures, I came to her rescue. I wonder if there's therapy for this?

On the day I was to pick her up, my coworker accompanied me to PetSmart to fill out the necessary paperwork for the adoption. It was then I noticed Persephone had an eye infection. On further inspection, both her ears were infected as well. The adoption coordinator began handing me eye ointment and ear drops. Then my coworker noticed that the cat's mouth was very inflamed. She recognized this as a possible sign of Bartonella infection a.k.a. Cat Scratch Disease which is transmittable to humans and can be quite serious. When we pointed this out to the coordinator she dismissed it as probably some random infection, but asked us to accompany her to her home so that she could begin an oral antibiotic..immediately!

Now ya gotta know, I just dropped $200 bucks on this cat because of her pedigree, only to find she had multiple infections. I told the coordinator that I wasn't willing to take the cat home while she was ill, but rather that she should call me when the cat was healthy and I would bring her home then. After I had time to think things through, I called her back and told her that, if after the necessary treatment the cat wasn't the picture of health, I would not pursue the adoption.

Well, a couple of weeks went by and the adoption person kept calling me to let me how "wonderfully" Persephone was doing and that I could take her home in a few days. I was skeptical, but when I went to pick her up, she seemed quite well. (the pictures I posted were from a day or two after we brought her home). However, within days she, once again, fell ill. She was vomiting and wouldn't eat. I had already made a post adoption appointment for that week, so I brought her in.

Well, this was one sick kitty. The vet felt she should be hospitalized, but decided he would treat her outpatient with the understanding that if there was no improvement by the following morning, she needed IV hydration, lab work and possibly x-rays. He further suggested that his office call the adoption agency and get an approval to treat the cat, since we had just brought her home and technically her care was still covered under the adoption agreement.

Well, to make a long story short, it ended up costing US another $200 for a cat that had only been ours for 4 days! The adoption agency only agreed to reimburse us 30% because...are ya ready???? We didn't get their permission to have her treated! While arguing with them over the phone in our vet's office, we learned that in addition to all Persephone's other medical issues, she had also tested positive for Cat Scratch Disease. They knew this all along, but encouraged us to take her home anyway.

My husband, to say the very least, is livid pissed!!!! If he didn't love me and respect the fact that as long as I live and breath, I will try to save every living thing on the face of the Planet, I'd probably be looking for a home with one of you as we speak!!!

Persephone is currently in the care of the adoption coordinator. Again, we made it clear that if her health issues were chronic, as suggested by our vet, we wanted to be reimbursed for the adoption. She told us she was unable to authorize it without permission from her "President".

Bullshit! The next morning, while my husband was online doing our banking, I asked him to see if they had cashed our adoption check. I was certain that they had, as I had written it out almost a month before. But...low and behold, they never cashed our check and thanks to the online "stop payment" option, now they never will!

I feel horrible having to give up Persephone. She's a sweet, loving, beautiful little soul. However, if our vet's predictions are correct, she will require continuous and costly medical treatment for the rest of her life and will be in a great deal of pain most of the time. Having so recently lost Autumn, I just can't...

As far as the bill for Persephone's care goes, I feel that at least it was the one thing I was able to give her.

After running around on Friday evening, we decided to stop in at a local pub for dinner.

Our dinner conversations have gotten considerably more interesting since Kyla and Justin are turning 13 years old. They are beginning to have more active social lives and every day brings home a plethora of the school day's activities and anecdotes. I'm really happy that they are enjoying themselves, although I'm somewhat concerned about how fast they are maturing, as any parent would be. I didn't know half the stuff that they do when I was 13!!! I ordered a glass of wine and began to peruse the menu. In mid sip Kyla turns to me and says, "I have to ask you something...what is a lap dance".

:::insert visual of me trying not to snort wine out my nose:::

"Excuse me?", I replied after I composed myself. "What's a lap dance?", she asked again. I was on a game online and people were talking about it, but no one would tell me what it was", Kyla replied.

Ok, so I was pretty impressed that my kid would trust in me enough to ask me this question, rather than "googling' the answer and hitting on images that might scar her for life! I also made a mental note to find out why lap dancing was being discussed online with my 13 year old!

I said, "Well, you know, ummm, it's kind of like, well...you know how, when someone dances...like in a club..and ummm. Ok, this wasn't going very well, was it? That said, I believe if your kids are going to trust you, you have to be as honest as you can with them. If they think you're sugar coating the truth or talking down to them, they'll never believe you when you really need to teach them something important. Since I've never been one to beat around the bush anyway (no pun intended), I told her, "listen, you know what a stripper is right?" She shook her head in acknowledgement. I said, "well a lap dance is when a stripper kind of dances on a guy's lap for money". I thought that was a fairly accurate, if not a tad evasive answer. "Oh", she replied. "Like a ho!"

::::insert visual image of me choking on wine AND snorting it out of my nose.

Enter Justin. Justin prefers interacting with adults much more than he does with his peers. As a result, he is very intelligent and has developed a rather extensive, yet colorful repertoire of phrases. He decided that last night was the time to bring me up to speed on the latest slang that has entered into his Middle School volcabulary.

Let's see...there was "p'owned", as in "ooooh, you got p'owned", which I believe replaces, "owned", which I believe had been "you got served", which I believe kind of means someone made you look like an ass! Then there's "WTF" which probably needs so further clarification, but just in case, it used to be an online acronym for "what the fuck!". Even that's been upgraded or downgraded to "da fuck!?" for those times when, ya know, using "What" or "WTF" is overkill. My personal favorite however, had to be...are ya ready..."I don't give a soaring fuck!"

::::again, wine, nose...you get the picture::::

I remembered some great advice Justin's teacher offered me right here on this blog. "Rest up", she said, "The teen years are coming".

The waiter came by to ask if there was anything else we needed. I said, "Yes. Can I get more wine?!"

It's going to be a long and interesting journey, but at least the music's good!!!

Saturday, June 6, 2009

So, after Autumn's passing (the cat, not the season) I half-heartedly promised myself that I wouldn't replace her. And while I don't believe I could ever replace Autumn, I always knew that I had the love in my heart to share with another little soul.

To that end, may I present...

Lady Persephone!

I'm finding that when she doesn't want to be brushed she likes to pretend to be something else. Ya know, just in case I might not notice!

Merry Meet!

I am a witchcraft practicing, conjure working, Full Moon worshipping daughter of the Arts.
I have been interested in Witchery for as long as I can remember. As a child, when I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, my answer was, "a Witch." The musing of a child?
I have been practicing for about 20 years, give or take a year and a day. I am a 2* Initiate in British Tradition Gardnerian Wicca.
We teach a training group in Gardnerian Wicca and can be found on Witchvox is "Circle of the Ancient Ways".
I am also a Okuden level, Jikiden Reiki practitioner, a Reiki Master/Teacher in Usui System of Natural Healing. I have had training as an End of Life doula.
In the mundane World, I am a Surgical Coordinator, wife and mother.